The official Storytelling site, http://www.storytellingmovie.com is now full
of content (hurray!). Look how much shorter Solondz bio is than Ted Hope and Christine
Vachon's. :) ...They say Storytelling'll be released on January 25th for NY &
LA, then additional cities on February 8th (what are the odds that'll include anywhere
around us?).

The French Storytelling site, http://www.diaphana.fr/storytelling is also
live and full of (different) content; so you might wanna check that one out, too; though
the text is, naturally, in French. But there's a bunch of good pics, etc.

Both links are also up on my links column on the main page (natch).

Thanks to Milk Man Dan, again, for the French site
link.

11/27/01

Look at Storytelling

Storytelling is currently slated for a January 25th release,
with Belle & Sebastian's people saying "early next year" for the
soundtrack. The book's release was also delayed, no doubt to correlate with the film's
release. Oh well; let's see if Fine Line lives up to these dates... In the
meantime, you can check out the pictures (below) and download the French trailer (English
language) at: http://www.commeaucinema.com/bandeannonces/storytelling/qt/storytelling.mov

Faber and Faber Inc., the same publishers that put out Solondz' Welcome
To the Dollhouse and Happiness screenplays, have already announced the release
of their Storytelling paperback (ISBN: 0-571-21283-2; dare we hope it will contain
the now infamous, excised sequences from the film?), with a December 3rd release date and
a list price of $13.00. Their description reads, "Todd Solandz offers two separate
stories that unfold amid the sadly comical terrain of college and high school. A young
female student has a stranger-than-fiction sexual encounter with her creative writing
tutor; and a struggling documentarian finds himself drawn into his material." It's
available for pre-order at Amazon, Barnes & Nobles, etc.

On a similar note, according to Amazon, the Storytelling
soundtrack, on Matador Records, has a November 13th release date.

10/1/01

Official Storytelling Site Up

Fine's Line official Storytelling site is finally live, confirming
that the film won't be released until 2002. There's really not much else there, yet, but
at least it shows Fine Line is finally starting the publicity machine ahead for Solondz'
latest effort. Coming as no surprise, the site lists the lead actors and does not include
James Van Der Beek or Heather Matarazzo (it also notes its R rating). The address is: www.storytellingmovie.com; which has also been
added to my links column.

9/6/01

Slightly Less Mutilated Storytelling DVD

Contractually obligated to give Fine Line Features an R-rated picture,
Todd Solondz has had to censor (in addition to the whole James Van Der Beek sequence) an
explicit sex scene with Selma Blair and Robert Wisdom from his latest film.
Well, according to a recently published article in IndieWIRE, Solondz claims the scene
will be included, un-censored, in foreign prints and the upcoming DVD, adding, "I
knew that the U.S. would be the only place - except for Iran and Iraq - that I would have
this problem... It's not just the MPAA; the studios are complicit and the whole country
has issues that you don't have to deal with abroad."
The same article also mentions that the MPAA also censored one of the trailers Solondz
wanted for the film, which explains why the big red box which covers the aforementioned
Blair/ Wisdom scene is there. "The MPAA didn't approve it," Solondz said,
"because it suggested they would be censors. While, strictly speaking, it's unfair to
say that the red box is censorship, this is one irrefutable example of censorship in the
trailer: they're not letting us state the facts about why there's a big red box in the
movie."
Well, it's good news, at least, that the one scene will find its way onto the DVD
uncensored, and, hey - maybe we could even get Solondz' proposed trailer on there, too,
but as far as the shorn Van Der Beek/ Matarazzo subplot, it still looks like we may never
see a non-butchered Storytelling. "I wish that I didn't have these
obstacles," Solondz said. "On the other hand, perhaps on some unconscious level,
that's what spurs me on."

8/16/01

Storytelling Preview in Premiere:

"It's two stories in one. And it's not exactly clear how
they relate to each other. "They resonate," says producer Christine Vachon (Boys
Don't Cry). In the first, "Fiction" (which was edited down so heavily that a
story line featuring a sexually confused James Van Der Beek disappeared), a college
student (Blair) leaves her handicapped boyfriend (Leo Pitzpatrick) to seduce her
African-American writing professor; in "Nonfiction," a documentary filmmaker
(Giamatti) reveals how clueless his teen subject (Webber) is, all under the suspicious
gaze of his parents (Goodman and Julie Haggerty). "I've never dealt with race as an
issue before," says Solondz (Happiness). "I know I'm playing with fire.
There's a certain thrill there. I know people will be offended by it." Happiness,
which dealt with pedophilia and masturbation, was released unrated, but Fine LIne wants to
open Storytelling with an R. So Solondz has placed a red box over strategic body
parts during the scene in which the professor thrusts against the student while forcing
her to yell the N-word.Eyes Wide Open: The cover-up is "the oppposite" pf what Stanley Kubrick
did in the orgy scene of Eyes Wide Shut, Solondz says. "I want the audience to
know [that what we're hiding] can't be digitally removed. That this is so
censored." - Premiere 9/01

8/01/01

Storytelling's Untold Story:

Ok. As I understand it, now, Solondz original cut of Storytelling
was about two and a half hours, rated NC-17, and featured three stories!
Apparently, the producers wanted the film cut for both a shorter running time and an R
rating. According to Dark Horizons, the shorn segment starred James van der Beek as"a closeted high school jock who becomes involved in a very explicit gay sex
scene," along with Heather Matarazzo and Emanuelle Chriqui (Detroit Rock City,
A.I. Artificial Intelligence). That's right, Matarazzo
is out of the picture, too! Hopefully (my fingers are crossed, but I'm not holding
my breath), the disappointing reception at Cannes (see below) might help
convince the film's producers to do right and restore the third segment for Storytelling's
official release. ...More relasitically, maybe we can just keep our fingers crossed for an
inclusive DVD?

7/27/01

Storytelling Soundtrack Information:

According to their official site, Belle and Sebastian recorded the music
for the second half of Storytelling, with the first part of the film being scored
by Shudder To Think's Nathan Larsson, who also composed the music for Boys
Don't Cry and High Art. They expect the film to be released in
October, with the soundtrack album coming out through Jeepster and Matador Records around
the same time.

7/4/01

Disturbing Storytelling news!

"Storytelling, the new film from Todd Solondz, got a lukewarm
reception from reviewers. Solondz is blaming its producers. He says they cut an entire
hour of it, including a controversial scene where James Van Der Beek of Dawson's Creek
fame engages in a homosexual sex act. In the version seen at Cannes, not only is the scene
gone, but also Van Der Beek is not seen at all." - from The Kansas City Star

"Director Todd Solondz is complaining that the producers of his new
movie made him edit out a scene in which James van der Beek is on the receiving end of
anal sex. When asked for a comment, van der Beek said, 'They were FILMING that?'"- from Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update